Winter seems to maybe, kind of, be slowly abating. Next weekend I’m headed down to the city to see some family; here’s hoping that after I make it back we’ll be into the full swing of spring. One can hope. Anyway – here is some discussion of a trip I took around California a few years back (Kate! If you’re reading this, this is from April *2011*. Don’t get confused now). I headed up to the Bay Area for some job interview action, checked out the Google campus, saw some friends, then went out for a ski weekend in Tahoe with Jen and Nathan – and we met up with Joe and his brother August while we there. In that year, Squaw had had 450″ of snow at the base of the mountain by April, and 700″ at the summit. Ye gads.
Have some Android releases
I drove up to the Bay Area on April 4th, and headed to Sunnyvale, where I was to have an interview at Applied Materials. The drive up was fairly uneventful, and I managed to stop a few times on the way, including finally, for once, at Pea Soup Anderson’s…where I discovered they were closed, since the water was shut down in the whole area. Anyway, I made it to the hotel just in time to take the shuttle over for presentations and dinner, and then went to bed.
See, this is how a creek crosses the aqueduct. Yup yup.
Check out Pea Soup Anderson’s!
The next day of interviews was pretty boring, as one might expect. I talked to lots and lots of people, but, other than that, it was just pretty dull. Never got any offers from this either, but, oh well. I spent a second night at the hotel, and then the next day I drove up to google for lunchtime. I met up with Chris, and he gave me a whole tour. We rode the little Google bikes, and went around a bunch of the campus, including seeing the maps buildings, and all the Android statues (I took a photo of myself with my Nexus One next to the Android android with *his* Nexus One), and we also had a really delicious lunch at the Beta Cafe (I think it was called). It was pretty cool, but Chris had to go back to work at some point, and I headed up the road just a bit, where I met up with Jenny at Stanford. We had a nice walk and talk, and then she also had to go to work. I then went…somewhere.
riding the Google bike.
Mine is a lot smaller. Alas.
I actually have no recollection at all of where I spent that evening. I know I met up with Liana on the 7th to go to Ken’s art showing at the Jewish Museum, after which we went to a little bit of the after-party, where I ended up talking with someone who had once dated Sossina Haile. Random. And that night, I think I stayed at Jen and Nick’s, where I guess I hung out during the day on the 8th. Maybe I saw some people…my memory is not so great! That evening, Nathan flew in, and Jen and I went over to OAK to pick him up. Once we had gotten him, we headed straight out towards Tahoe, stopping briefly for a bite at In’n’Out. Jen had recently started eating meat again, and said this was only her second cheeseburger ever. Winning for us!
Mmmmmm, burger. (sorry this isn’t the very bestest photo Jen, but…burger!)
Anyway, after a mildly terrifying drive up I-80 in the dark, with slight snow skirling around us, poor visibility, and lots of cars going faster than me, we eventually made it to Squaw, and the Resort at Squaw Creek. This is the more “family friendly” side of the equation, but they had a good deal on a ski-and-stay package, so it worked out. Anyway, we got to our room, and collapsed into little piles. The next day we got up, and headed over to the main resort, stopping at Tahoe Dave’s on the way for me to pick up my rental gear. We first took the gondola up, which was a pretty impressive ride…that thing is big. Nathan and Jen stayed with me that morning as I went over some of the easiest rides. Squaw has wide open bowls, and no real named runs. Instead, the code each area for the difficulty that each chair leads to. But each time you go down an area, you have options for how hard/easy you can make it (Well – they did at the time of visit, and initial writing – in the years since, I believe they have changed to named runs). It took a bit for me to get my feet comfortable under myself, but it started coming together reasonably quickly. Anyway, they went off after a bit to do some more challenging stuff, and I hung out more in the easy zone, maybe straying a hair toward some of the blues.
Seriously, where is the horizon line?
At the end of the day, we managed to meet up with Joe and August, who had also come out for a week of skiing. We sat around with them and had a beer, and then agreed to meet up that night for dinner. We went to the Pfeifer House, which was a pretty amusing German restaurant, though not inexpensive. Apparently after that, Joe and August went out for some more fun, but the three of us proceeded to collapse into bed, more or less.
Hanging with Joe (seriously, I have everyone in pairs, or solo, but no group pic. Shame on me.)
Jen’s knee was hurting her the next day, so she wasn’t up for much skiing, but she took me and Nathan back over to the slopes, and we went up, did a couple of baby runs, and then met up with Joe. The two of them worked with me on the blues for a bit, and generally got me to turn more often! Which apparently I wasn’t doing, since all I was trying to do was basically stop on each turn, and then make the next turn, but was ending up losing control that way, rather than gaining it. So that was wrong. Turning for winning. Or at least skiing.
Such a nice view. Nice? Yes. Nice. I will use the word.
Joe and Nathan then went off to ski for a little bit, and I worked on the blues some myself. We then all met up again, and August came up to ski a bit (I might have the timing off a bit), and eventually we all came back for lunch. After that, Nathan and I went down to go meet up with Jen again, and drive back. We got to the Bay Area, spent the night at Jen and Nick’s, and then drove home the following day.
The only u-turn light signal itself I’ve ever seen
